


sometimes i’m a lover / of my own dysfunction

by fab_ia



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: Drinking, M/M, Smoking, Trans Male Character, Vague AU, riemann? a decent person? accidentally, there's no goddard and they're in paris and clarke swears he was just looking for a one night stand
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-18
Updated: 2019-03-18
Packaged: 2019-11-23 20:32:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18156713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fab_ia/pseuds/fab_ia
Summary: “This is your place? With the price tag this apartment’s got, I’m curious why you were in that shitty bar.”“No such luck,” he says, faking a sigh. “’tis but a rental. I’m escaping.”“I can drink to that,” Victor chuckles, raising his glass. “To freedom, then.”





	sometimes i’m a lover / of my own dysfunction

The bar wasn’t a  _ good _ one, per se, air thick enough with smoke and the smell of alcohol that it’s become weighted and heavy, but David can’t say that he minds overly much, red wine in hand and bitter smoke still burning his nose from when he’d slipped outside moments ago for arguably the quickest smoke of his life. He’s drunk - drunk enough that his eyes are wandering, slipping up and down the forms of strangers with a long-practiced ease, but never enough to lock eyes with one. Nervousness, though lessened, is still apparent in the tightening of his chest, and the flush he knows would be more obvious if it weren’t for the terrible lighting, or the fact he could simply blame it on the wine.

There is one, though - dark hair, darker skin than half the crowd David’s found himself around him that he blends in with (once more, thanks to the lights he’s under and the fact his father is such a  _ Brit _ that he looks white to most anyway). Guy’s got dark eyes, from what David can tell across the way, and he’s fit enough that it’s a fair assumption that he goes to the gym every day.

Bastard.

But of course, he’s been staring, and eventually he’s caught and he locks eyes with the guy and  _ huh _ , alright, okay, he’s hot. It’s probably the leather jacket, they always make people look far fucking hotter than they are, and this guy’s is littered with pins and okay, David’s still staring, but it’s getting a little hard to look away.

Eventually he winds up at the side of the room, back against the wall while looking the stranger in the eyes and focusing on keeping his gaze up and not letting it slide back down to his lips. He’s telling him some kind of story, painfully dull, but he’s got a nice voice and he doesn’t sound  _ French _ , which is what David cared about anyway, so he reaches out to catch his sleeve in a hand before he asks “do you fancy getting out of here?”

Hot Stranger agrees, and they’re back up in David’s rented flat within ten minutes. It’s only then that the stranger seems to realise he hasn’t yet told David his name, which he works out by the sudden wince and the hurried way he sticks out his hand with a “Victor.”

“David,” he replies with an easy smile, nodding at the sofa before buggering off into the kitchen. “Fancy some wine? It’s Merlot.”

“I’m usually a beer guy, but I’ll bite,” Victor grins, shark-like, before glancing out of the doors that lead to the balcony. “This is your place? With the price tag this apartment’s got, I’m curious why you were in that shitty bar.” His questions don’t seem forced or strained, coming easy, tongue likely loosed by alcohol going at a couple euros a pint. David’s responding smile as he comes back and hands him one of the wine glasses filled with the sanguine drink, at least, is for exactly that reason.

“No such luck,” he says, faking a sigh. “’tis but a rental. I’m escaping.”

“I can drink to that,” Victor chuckles, raising his glass. “To freedom, then.”

They finish the bottle quickly and laughter comes easily after that. At some point, David turned the radio on, and it’s playing some jazz he can’t bring himself to say he hates. Victor’s legs are tangled with his after they moved closer to each other, before David catches sight of the cardboard in Victor’s jacket and asks if he fancies a smoke. After blinking at him for a second, Victor huffs a laugh, pulls them out and frowns.

“No lighter,” he says, “ _ Bugger _ . Little shit I lent it to must’ve pocketed it.”

“I’ve got a better idea,” David breathes, hands going to his own pockets before he produces his own lighter and a packet, albeit a little more crumpled than the one Victor tossed onto the coffee table. “Light it off mine. I’ll open the balcony so we don’t set off the fire alarm or something. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather not try and make it down the stairs pissed.”

Victor’s answer is a chuckle, and soon enough they’re smoking with their shins touching and the breeze cooling the scarlet flush slowly creeping up their skin. Ash drops to David’s leg and it strikes him, as he brushes it off, that he couldn’t give less of a sod, and brushes it off and onto the carpet. It earns a faintly horrified noise from Victor, but he blows smoke in his direction to quiet him.

“Did you invite me up here for your delightful company and cheap wine,” Victor starts, stretching, “or was there something else on your mind? I mean, I saw the way you looked at me.”

“I like leather jackets. I like  _ men _ in leather jackets.”

“Yeah, I got that.”

“It suits you.”

Victor doesn’t have a response to that besides a snort, eyes flicking to David’s shoulders before he takes another drag and lets the smoke out slowly.

“Tell me I’m hot, then,” David pouts, tapping the ash half-over the ashtray and half-over the table, moving closer to Victor until they’re side-by-side and their arms are touching. “Go on. I can tell you’re thinking it. C’mon. I won’t tell anyone you’re into guys, if that’s what you’re scared of.”

“You’re crazy,” Victor snorts, and he has the decency to wait until the cigarettes have both burned up before he kisses him.

Kissing Victor, David finds, is an experience he can’t say he’d mind going through again. He’s rough and a little demanding, just how he likes it, and he’s tugging on his shirt sharply. It’s going to stretch it, but David doesn’t care. He just kisses back, focuses on the taste of wine and beer mixing with smoke and something else, focuses on the leather beneath his hands and the way that somehow, without even realising, he’s made his way into Victor’s lap, and found himself thoroughly occupied with kissing Victor breathless.

He ends up breathless first, though, pulling away with a laugh as he locks eyes with Victor and sees what he thinks is self-satisfaction in them. “Alright, alright, I can take a hint,” David chuckles. “I’ll take you to bed when I shut the doors. It’s – well, I’m sure you can find it.”

“I’m sure I can,” Victor says, kissing him again before he can get up and tend to the doors that have attracted a mild congregation of pigeons outside, before heading to the bedroom where Victor has seen it fit to rid himself of the jacket and the shirt.

“You have  _ got _ to be kidding me with those muscles,” David says, before his hands go to the buttons on his own shirt and he freezes. “ _ Ah _ . I forgot to mention, earlier, but I’m – “

“Transgender,” Victor says. “That’s the right word, isn’t it? You’re wearing a black binder under a white shirt and it’s not exactly the most subtle you could have been.”

“Right. And you don’t – mind?”

“I don’t see a reason to. You’re still hot.”

Christ, David could kiss him, and that’s exactly what he does. Kneels beside him on the bed and tugs him up into a kiss, hardly paying attention to the satisfied noise Victor makes when he does. This kiss is as rough as the first, and his shirt is being unbuttoned and slid off of his shoulders far quicker than it happens in the movies – David should know, he’s watched enough of them to know that the stripping usually lasts longer than the actual sex, which isn’t filling him with a great deal of hope, even if he knows this is decidedly  _ not  _ a movie.

The two of them aren’t quiet, that much David can tell, as when Victor kisses down his throat he hears himself making noises, arching up into every touch – and his hands, his hands are so warm, so big, so  _ nice _ . He’s naked on the bed, quickly – and the hands are back, exploring his chest, across his hips and thighs and everywhere Victor can reach. David loves it. He loves every single second of it.

Victor calls him beautiful all night, even when David knows his face is flushed and damp with sweat because the bedroom is  _ hot _ – even when he misjudges what he can handle and ends up sitting up with spit running down his chin as he coughs. Victor pulls him onto another bruising kiss, and that’s how it ends – together, covers up over some of their calves, facing each other, breaths heaving and David’s stomach sticky where he didn’t quite manage to lower his face in time.

“Sorry about the mess,” Victor says, accent thicker than it had been on the sofa. “I’ve not done anythin’ like this in a long while.”

“It’s fine,” David says. “You’re lucky you’re so bloody hot, and that you’re a damn good shag, because I’d probably be considering kicking you out if you weren’t.”

“Glad to see my one talent saved me,” Victor chuckles, eyes sparkling with mirth, and David can’t  _ not _ kiss him, really.

“Stay ‘till tomorrow,” David mumbles. “We’ll get breakfast. Get to know each other.”

“I don’t think that’s the proper etiquette for a one-night stand,” Victor points out, and he makes a fair case, but David finds he doesn’t particularly care.

“I don’t think usual etiquette is inviting them for wine and a smoke either, but here we are,” David says. “You seem  _ interesting _ . I want to get to know you.”

“So, what you’re saying, Victor says, “is that we’ve just fucked, and now you’ve decided that you want to take me out on a date. To breakfast. Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow morning,” David nods, “or maybe it’s just later today, now. It’s a little bit of a blur, if I’m honest. But yes. A shower and breakfast, and I intend to discover everything about you.”

Victor chuckles, just a little, shakes his head as he brushes his now-messy hair from his face, not meeting his eyes anymore. “I can’t stay,” he says. “Got places to go, people to see, things to do… I’m sure you know how it is.”

“Yeah,” David sighs. “You’ve got to see a man about a dog.”

“Something like that,” Victor nods, kissing David’s cheek before he stands to get dressed again. Watching him is a pleasure, of course, but it’ll still be sad to see him go. He’d actually had a really good time.

“Will I see you again?” David asks, when he stands at the door. Victor looks at him – eyes dark in the room, the only light coming from the street outside.

He doesn’t reply. Instead, he just slips out, closes the door behind him and buggers off into the night as David rolls over and presses his face into the pillow, fresh linen scent lost to the two of them, and overtaken with the heavier mix of booze and aftershave that Victor had borne as a defining feature of himself. He shouldn’t like it - he should, really, be a little disgusted, but David can’t deny that it’s really quite a  _ nice _ smell, and he drifts of with his nose placed squarely in the centre of the indent left by Victor’s head. 

 

Dreaming, David has often found, is wholeheartedly pointless, and his dreams of passion and lust are no different, fantasy mixed with the memories of the man above him kissing him so deeply while they’d moved, gasping into the still air of the bedroom. He calls them pointless because they ultimately are - they achieve nothing except a profound sense of frustration, or embarrassment, or  _ want _ .

He wakes without a gasp - instead, he yawns, burrowing into the duvet for a few more moments before stretching and getting up, padding through to the kitchen naked except for the heart-patterned underwear he’d pulled on from the drawer. The curtains are drawn anyway, and it’s not as though people were much in the habit of staring into neighbouring flats out of sheer loneliness. Although dulled by the cloth, the windows are large enough to illuminate the place a fair amount, which makes it plenty easy for him to find the kettle and get himself a cup of tea. 

What a way to spend the morning - lounging on the sofa with a mug of tea made just how he likes it, comfortable in both himself and his situation, before something catches his eye and breaks the spell of calm like a shot to the heart.

A note. A simple note, yes, but the scrap of paper has ‘call me’ on it in a messy hand, with a phone number below that - thank the Lord - David’s service provider lets him call free. Hallelujah, and all that.

Mustering up the courage to actually call takes hours, mind you, and his hands tremble as he listens to the dialling, waits for an answer that might not even come, in the end, before his slowly spiralling thoughts are cut off with a chuckle and an amused “David? I really hope it  _ is _ you.”

“It’s me,” David says quietly, smiling to himself as he lays down on the sofa, staring up at the ceiling. “Victor. Hey.”   
“I wasn’t going to leave you without my number,” he laughs. “You’re far too pretty for that. How’s the head? Hungover?”   
“No,” David grins. “I’m just fine. How, um, how are you?”

Victor’s answering laugh is a little breathless, a lot rough, and it does something in David’s chest that makes him smile when he hears it. He sounds relaxed, he sounds calm, and while he might usually envy people who can sound that carefree, David likes that it seems to come so easily to Victor. 

“Well,” Victor says, voice lowering. “I’ve been thinkin’. All about last night, and how beautiful you looked. I told you how good you looked like that, didn’t I? With my hands all over you and your mouth full-”

Victor cuts himself off with a sigh, and David understands, suddenly, exactly what’s happening. He lets out a breathless laugh at the fact it took him this long, before shifting so he can put the phone call on speaker before shoving a hand into his shorts. 

“You told me plenty,” he grins, not bothering to hide the shudder in his voice as he rubs a finger against himself. “But I could stand to hear it again. I, ah, I take it to mean you’d like to see me again?”

“I’d like that just fine,” Victor says, before groaning, low and loud, into the phone, and David knows this is going to be  _ more _ than good.

 

Victor comes with a shout minutes later, and David follows with a whine, hips bucking up into his hand before he melts into the cushions again, giggling a little. “That,” he breathes, “I have to say, is not how I imagined the evening going. I expected to get drunk and end up with a stranger in the bathroom, but this was… far better.”

“Good,” Victor says, audibly shifting on the bed. “Mmh, okay, that was very good. Can I come over?”   
“What, you’re still horny?”   
“I’ll be able to go again,” Victor laughs. “I was thinking more wine, some takeout, more making out and smoking while a movie’s on?”   
A moment of hesitation later, David laughs. “So, a date, but also  _ not _ , because it’ll be in my flat?”   
“Something like that,” Victor says quietly. “If you want. I don’t know.”   
“I want,” David says. “I want very much. So long as you promise you’ll stay this time?”

“I’ll stay,” Victor promises.

 

He comes round - an hour? An hour and a half later, maybe, and he grins at David’s outfit. A jumper and underwear, plus socks. David blushes a little, because Victor’s in tight jeans and a nice shirt, and maybe he should have made a little more effort, but Victor kisses him anyway, cupping his cheeks and rubbing his thumb against the red spots there.

“Hey, hot stuff,” Victor laughs. “Take it you missed me?”

“I didn’t expect to ever see you again,” David says, reaching up to cover Victor’s hands with his own. “You left me your  _ number _ .”

“I did, yeah,” he replies. “I almost didn’t expect you to call. It took you long enough, anyway.”

_ I was nervous _ , David doesn’t say, instead shifting so they’re holding hands, before pulling Victor back inside with him, until their knees are interlocked on the sofa, and he can kiss him once again. It’s soft, nowhere near as rough and passionate as their previous kisses - it’s yielding, and gentle. There’s  _ feeling  _ behind it, and it throws him just a little before he closes his eyes and lets it happen.

They sit on the sofa - David grabs the blanket he’d draped over the back and wraps it around his shoulders, smiling a little as he and Victor talk - talk, talk, and talk some more, and it’s so nice to just be able to relax around another person again, for the first time in what feels like months.

“Why are you in France?” Victor asks, after David tells a story about university where his flatmate had ended up half-naked and drunk at the nightclub. “Have you got family you’re visiting?”

“I…” David winces. “No, I don’t. I told you the other day, I’m escaping.”

“What are you escaping, then?”

David hesitates. It’s not something he’s ever told anyone, having ignored his family’s calls and messages the whole time he’s been away. Victor winces, seeing his hesitation, and his words trip over one another as they fall from his lips - “you don’t have to say! I was just curious - you really don’t have to tell me, I know it’s personal, and all-”

“It’s fine,” David says, smiling a little. “I’m… here to get away from my family. Mostly. I just wanted a break from having to be the  _ perfect son _ . Since I came out, they’ve expected me to be the best, to be better, but I just…”

“When did you come out?”   
“Three, four, years ago.”

“And… how old are you?”   
David smiles. “I’m twenty-four.”

There’s a good few moments of silence as Victor stares at him, eyes wide as he takes in the sight of David fully once again. It gets uncomfortable fairly quickly, and David shifts, running a hand through his hair as he laughs a little nervously.

“I - am I too young for you, then?”

“No,” Victor says softly. “No, you aren’t. I just… they’ve been putting this much pressure on you for that long?”

Ah.

David shrugs, brushing a little hair out of his face as he stares at his crossed legs on the couch and Victor reaches, cups his chin, lifts his head up slowly to meet his eyes. It’s… nice, he thinks. He smiles back at Victor before he’s pulled into a kiss, another gentle one as Victor strokes his hair gently.

“What?”

“I just think you deserve better,” Victor sighs. 

David laughs, covering his eyes as he flushes. “You don’t even  _ know _ me, Victor! You just know my first name and that I - I like men. And women, a lot of the time.”

Victor kisses the back of David’s hand, rubs his knuckles with a thumb and says “I think that’s plenty to make a good judgement on whether or not you deserve to have all this dumped on you, David.”

He huffs, but lets Victor take his hands and hold them, gently. “Why are  _ you _ here, then?”

“Me?” Victor grins, squeezes his hands gently. “A vacation. France is pretty nice, this time of year. Plus, if you get lucky, you can get a pretty guy to take you home.”

“Charmer,” David scoffs, before tugging him into another kiss.

  
  


It’s not surprising that the kisses turn more passionate, but David hums into it cheerfully anyway, lets Victor tug him into his lap, hands going to his messy hair and tugging a little at it. It’s messy but still soft, albeit a little tangled, but it’s good enough that he can tug a little on it and appreciate the groan it draws from Victor’s lips as he tilts his head back - breaking the kiss, but giving David a better chance to lean in and mouth at his throat, biting down a little and grinning when Victor’s groan drops lower.

“We’re doing  _ this _ , are we?” he asks, and David grins against his skin, sucks a mark there and listens to the hissed breath between his teeth.

“If you please,” David says, voice soft, shifting a little and licking his lips when he feels Victor under him. “The bedroom?”

“ _ If you please _ ,” Victor echoes, picking him up and carrying him through to the bedroom where he lays him, gentle as he can, on the bed. David winks up at him before wriggling out of the jumper until Victor is staring at his bare chest.

“You’re  _ so _ hot,” Victor sighs. “People have told you that before, haven’t they? Just how beautiful you are?”

“A few,” he says, stretching. “There was Warren -  _ lord _ , the things that man can do with his tongue… and there’s Enlil, too, but he lives too far away to touch me, y’know?”

“Pity,” Victor says in a voice that’s practically a purr. “If I were him, I’d have paid for a plane ticket just to come and see you. How far-”

“The ticket would have cost about five hundred pounds, if not more. Can we stop talking about my exes, now, and you can get to fucking me, finally?”

“Impatient,” Victor huffs, but moves so he can take off his trousers and shirt, leaving his underwear on as he leans over David to kiss him again, and if he grinds a little against him, David isn’t going to comment on it.

He’s not sure how long they spend half-naked and making out on top of tangled sheets before they finish getting undressed, and Victor presses inside him after rolling a condom down onto himself, bent over him. Breathless and red-faced, David thinks he looks amazing as he arches his back and begs him for  _ more _ .

He gets the more he asked for - Victor fucks him hard into the bed, before moving between his legs to eat him out afterwards, until David is close to tears when he comes with a cry of Victor’s name, breathless but still loud in the bedroom when all other sound is the muffled city outside or the ragged breaths of the two of them.

 

Victor kisses him again and it’s a little off-putting when he can taste himself as he kisses him, but it’s still ridiculously hot, and he can’t say he has much of a problem with it.

“That,” he says a few moments later, voice thick and mind slow with the afterglow, “was really fucking good.”

“Glad you think so,” Victor says, smug, before stretching out beside him before he rolls onto his back. “Mm. Can I borrow your lighter again?”

“Yeah, if you pass me a cigarette,” David says with a grin, moving to prop himself up against the headboard. “And if you stay tonight.”

“Already said I would, didn’t I?” Victor huffs, but it’s light-hearted. “Might stay tomorrow night, too, if you don’t mind that.”

“I don’t mind,” David says, grinning at him. “I don’t mind that at  _ all _ .”

Victor flashes him a smile, softer than he’d expected, and David feels something warm in his chest and thinks that this, between the two of them, could really be something good. His… his  _ partner  _ lights the cigarette he holds between his teeth before blowing smoke from his own into his face, laughing when David splutters, and it’s disgusting for a whole multitude of reasons, but he can’t say that me minds it a great deal, especially when he does the same thing only a few moments later.

Victor calls him disgusting and he laughs, kisses him and points out how much he  _ likes _ it.

 

A few months later, he uses the word ‘love’ instead, not realising until a few moments too late, and he feels his face burn before Victor kisses his cheek and says “you’re right, I do,” and that warm feeling in his chest grows until it overtakes him, and he’s smiling wider than he has in a long while.

**Author's Note:**

> yeeha w if you enjoyed this i'm on tumblr @sciencematter thanks for reading my dumb niche ship
> 
> title is from 'Traumarama!' by bev yockelson:
> 
> https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/148991/traumarama


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